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What God Says About Guilt and How to Overcome It

Discover what God says about guilt and learn practical steps for overcoming it. Find hope, healing, and grace in your journey towards forgiveness.

How often do you find yourself speaking the following phrases to yourself: “I should have… I shouldn’t have… I should know better… I did it again… I’m so bad!”

That is guilt talking. While feelings of guilt are helpful if they lead you to repentance, guilt can also drive you away from God if you listen to Satan’s lies and keep telling yourself you are bad and can never be good enough to not feel guilty.

Have you ever felt suffocated by guilt, wondering if you can ever escape its grip?

Joyce Meyers has some good things to say about guilt in her article about how to leave the burden of guilt behind. She says,

Guilt is mainly caused by the way we think about God’s expectations of us, our sin (mistakes), and the remedy for our sin. Guilt enters as a thought, which creates a feeling, and then we live by that feeling.
But here’s some more good news: We don’t have to live by our feelings or make decisions based on them.
If we’re smart, we won’t believe our feelings when we know they don’t line up with what God tells us in His Word. And God’s Word tells us that Jesus has paid the price for the forgiveness of our sins and removed our guilt.

This article you are reading now will explore what God says about guilt and how to take practical steps to overcome the guilt you are feeling.

If you are someone who is seeking spiritual guidance and emotional healing from feelings of guilt and shame, desiring practical steps to find peace and forgiveness through God’s words that will help you transform your burdens into grace and freedom, then this article is for you.

The goal of this article is to empower you with biblical insights and encouragement for your journey toward healing and renewal.

We’ll be learning about how to understand guilt — its types, its psychological impact, and the consequences of living with guilt. We’ll see what God has to say about guilt in the Bible as well as what the Bible says about the provision that has been made for overcoming guilt through God’s forgiveness and God’s mercy.

As you read, discover what God says about guilt and learn practical steps for overcoming it. Find hope, healing, and grace in your journey towards forgiveness.

Understanding Guilt

A woman looking away with words what God says about guilt and how to overcome it.

Guilt is a feeling of responsibility or remorse for a perceived offense or wrongdoing. Becky of So Very Blessed writes in an article about the difference between guilt and shame that guilt helps guide our behavior and helps us navigate through right and wrong. It serves as a sensor to change your behavior in the future.

In addition to that feeling of responsibility or remorse, GotQuestions defines guilt in a stricter way:

Guilt is the result of having violated a specific rule or law. When we cross a moral, ethical, or legal line, we are guilty. This is true even if we did not know a line was crossed. Guilt is primarily a state or condition, not a feeling. According to the Bible, we are all guilty before God (Romans 3:10, 23). The fact that a person may not ‘feel guilty’ does not affect his or her guilty status legally or morally.

Even so, feelings of guilt will usually come when you have done something that causes guilt. Even though such feelings are sorrowful and don’t feel good, they are helpful in guiding you to repentance.

Sometimes, however, feelings of guilt can lead you away from God, and Satan is good at causing you to focus on that kind of guilt.

Types of Guilt

It is common to think of guilt as being something bad that you want to avoid, but guilt is not always a negative thing.

The feeling of guilt you get when you do something wrong can serve as a moral compass, telling you when you have made a mistake and guiding you into making better choices in the future.

Guilt can make you want to apologize or make amends when you have hurt someone else, and try to learn from your mistakes to avoid future mistakes.

However, guilt can also be mismanaged; when that happens, it leads to excessive stress about mistakes you may have made in the past and causes you to think excessively negative thoughts toward yourself. This is harmful to your mental and emotional health.

Healthy guilt is a response to a specific mistake or wrong-doing that causes you to confess your sin in order to find forgiveness, taking responsibility to make amends, or apologizing to someone after hurting them or wronging them in some way.

Healthy guilt motivates you to make a positive change to repair your error and uphold your values and ethical standards.

Unhealthy guilt happens when you feel guilty for imagined actions or situations out of your control or when you have already made amends for something yet still feel bad about it. It is accompanied by excessive self-blame and self-punishment, and feeling unworthy and flawed.

When this happens, you feel paralyzed and convinced that nothing and no one can help you. Unhealthy guilt leads to a negative self-image and colors your attitude towards God and your approach to Him.

The Psychological Impact of Guilt

Even though guilt can be good for you if it leads to a correction of error and seeking forgiveness or a change in behavior, it can also have a psychological impact that affects mental health.

Unresolved or unhealthy guilt can lead to physical responses such as muscle tension and stress, fatigue, insomnia, and digestive issues, as well as mental and emotional issues such as anxiety or depression.

In a WebMD article about the signs of guilt, it is stated that guilt has a role in disorders like obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and depression:

Guilt’s relationship to other disorders is two-way. It can either cause a disorder or perpetuate one. OCD and depression are two significant others to guilt. OCD is all about recurring thoughts (obsessions) and actions (compulsions) that are uncontrollable. Guilt can act as a predecessor or an enabler for OCD… As with guilt and OCD, guilt and depression feed off each other. Guilt enables depressive symptoms. It manifests as feeling bad about feeling depressed, and it compounds over time.

Biblical References Regarding Guilt

Throughout God’s Word there are biblical teachings on guilt, as well as numerous stories of people who found relief from their guilt through forgiveness. Some of the key passages that discuss guilt are as follows:

For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.

James 2:10

The Bible is very clear that the breaking of any part of the moral code or law makes you guilty.

“If anyone sins and does what is forbidden in any of the Lord’s commands, even though they do not know it, they are guilty and will be held responsible.

Leviticus 5:17

The Bible is also clear that guilt comes whether you realize you are breaking a law or not.

For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.

Psalm 51:3

God has given everyone the ability to feel guilt and know when they are guilty of transgression, and God moves in them to call them to repentance.

…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…

Romans 3:23

Everyone is guilty of sinning and in need of a way to find forgiveness from their guilt.

With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”

Isaiah 6:7

God is willing to take away the guilt of those who seek His grace and mercy; He has provided a way for them to find atonement.

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 6:23

Unpaid-for guilt leads to death, but God provided atonement and freedom from guilt through the work of Jesus Christ on the cross.

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

2 Corinthians 5:21

Jesus was not guilty of any sin, which made him the perfect sacrifice bringing about forgiveness from guilt. You can become righteous like God through the work of Jesus Christ.

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

1 John 1:9

All you need to do to become righteous and free from guilt is confess that you are guilty, and God will forgive you and make you clean every single time.

Let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.

Hebrews 10:22

When God has cleansed you from your guilt, you can rest assured that you are clean and you do not need to remember that guilt any longer.

What God Says About Guilt

As you can see, God has a lot to say about guilt. No one is free of guilt because all have taken part in wrongdoing and sin — all except Jesus.

God knew this would be the case with fallen men, so He provided the means by which you can approach Him again and receive forgiveness and redemption.

Biblical Verses on Guilt

Continuing on with looking at scripture passages that address guilt, there are several that stand out as promises of the mercy and grace that God gives to those who are drowning in guilt.

This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.

Romans 3:22-24

When you believe in Jesus’ work to cleanse you from guilt, no matter your background or race or what you have done, you are justified by grace and find redemption in Him. You can set your guilt aside and not think about it again!

Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them and in whose spirit is no deceit.

Psalm 32:1-2  

When you are in Christ, you can be confident that God has forgiven all of your sins, and those sins no longer count against you. God has totally set them aside and you are no longer guilty.

Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin.

Psalm 32:5

The key to finding relief from guilt is to confess what you have done that has made you guilty. Acknowledging it and taking it to God allows Him to forgive you and make you free from that guilt.

Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.

2 Corinthians 7:10

Godly sorrow is what leads you to realize you need to repent and seek forgiveness. Worldly sorrow is when you are filled with condemnation and hopelessness over your guilt, thinking you are bad and nothing can help you be good again.

This kind of sorrow does not allow you to trust God for healing and freedom from your guilt.

As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.

Psalm 103:12

When you have done something wrong and received forgiveness for it, it is sometimes easy to keep feeling guilty about it and worrying that maybe you were not actually forgiven.

This verse is a good reminder that when God takes away your sins, He takes them away completely and they are literally gone, along with your guilt.

Let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.

Hebrews 10:22

This is a beautiful reminder that you have access to God at any time and you can approach Him with confidence and faith, totally free from guilt and condemnation.

If you are cleansed by Jesus’ atonement, you are clean and can approach God. Don’t let feelings of guilt prevent you from drawing near to Him.

God’s View on Sin and Guilt

God perceives sin as a breaking of His law, going against what He desires to be done, disobeying what He commanded. Sin brings a state of guilt upon everyone that cannot be taken away without God’s intervention and mercy.

While sin separates the disobedient from God, He doesn’t ever want that separation and has therefore made gracious and merciful provision for relief from sin and guilt.

GotQuestions does a good job of explaining the meaning of guilt in relation to God’s perception of sin and His role in making a way for breakers of His law to approach Him once more:

From the moment Adam and Eve broke God’s law against eating the forbidden fruit, guilt entered human history (Genesis 3). With that guilt came a feeling of being guilty. They knew they had violated a specific law. They were guilty, and they felt guilty. God demonstrated His plan to cover human guilt with the shedding of innocent blood (Genesis 3:21; cf. Hebrews 9:22). What God did in the garden was a picture of what He would do thousands of years later to cover the guilt of everyone who trusts in His only begotten Son (John 1:12; 3:16–18; Romans 10:9–10).

The same website deals with the question of how God’s mercy and justice work together in salvation:

Christianity is unique in that God’s mercy is shown through His justice. There is no setting aside of justice to make room for mercy. The Christian doctrine of penal substitution states that sin and injustice were punished at the cross of Christ and it’s only because the penalty of sin was satisfied through Christ’s sacrifice that God extends His mercy to undeserving sinners who look to Him for salvation.

Role of Jesus in Relieving Guilt

Jesus Christ’s sacrifice offers freedom from guilt, as is declared in Romans 8:1:

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

The only One who can ever condemn you is God because He is the one whose law you have broken when you sin, so He is responsible for your punishment. But if you are in Christ, then you are free from that condemnation and guilt because Jesus took that punishment on your behalf.

That is what grace is: God granting cleansing from guilt and shame in spite of that being what you deserve because He considers it already dealt with by Jesus.

The Consequences of Living with Guilt

When you live with guilt that has not been dealt with or forgiven, it will eventually affect your sense of self-worth and might lead to behaviors that affect work, relationships, and personal esteem.

Emotional and Mental Health Effects

As mentioned earlier in this article, unresolved or unhealthy guilt can lead to physical responses such as muscle tension and stress, fatigue, insomnia, and digestive issues, as well as mental and emotional issues such as anxiety or depression.

Prolonged feelings of guilt or unresolved guilt can also have adverse effects on relationships, producing shame, low self-esteem, strained interactions or distancing yourself from others.

It can also contribute to guilt-tripping and manipulation of the relationship, as well as setting poor boundaries because of feelings of guilt.

Spiritual Consequences

The spiritual consequences of unresolved guilt are even greater. Even as strained interactions exist between people, guilt can hinder one’s relationship with God and the ability to receive His love and forgiveness.

When you remain stuck in guilt, you may eventually find yourself feeling like you are too far gone to be forgiven. That’s when guilt becomes a road block and a barrier to forgiveness — not that God won’t forgive you, but you think He won’t!

Nothing could be further than the truth, of course, but it is hard to see that clearly when you are burdened with guilt and shame.

God does not want there to be a barrier between you, He wants you to accept His grace and put aside your guilt as soon as possible.

The Burden of Unresolved Guilt

Unresolved guilt can lead you to feeling like you are too guilty to be forgiven. That is such a burden to carry around, because in addition to the weight of the unresolved guilt, you are also carrying around the reasons for the guilt that you are perhaps trying to keep secret. 

Perhaps you are also trusting in your own vain attempts to absolve yourself of guilt by making excuses. Only God can heal you and take that burden away.

Unresolved guilt can lead to mental or emotional distress. If you struggle with unresolved guilt, you might feel you need to suffer or punish yourself for hurting others.

Self-punishment takes many different forms, such as negative self-talk, taking too many risks, or engaging in self-harm

Carrying a burden of guilt will affect you in your daily life, affecting your relationships as you pull away and become self-focused, affecting your ability to make decisions, and growing numb to God and turning away from fellowship with Him. All this will end up destroying your happiness.

How to Overcome Guilt

As you can see, refusing to acknowledge your guilt might seem like a good strategy for keeping it from upsetting your everyday life, but that solution is only temporary at best.

Truly addressing guilt requires you to first recognize and acknowledge your guilt, however unpleasant that may be.

Recognizing and Acknowledging Guilt

A good first step to dealing with guilt is to recognize and acknowledge its presence. Trying to ignore or suppress your guilt will only make it more intense.

Instead, take some time to reflect on your feelings and identify what might be causing your feelings of guilt.

The Charlie Health website lists some tips for how to get over guilt, one of which is to practice self-reflection:

Taking time for self-reflection allows you to understand the root causes of your guilt and its impact on your life. Journaling can be a particularly effective tool for this process, as it provides a safe space to express your thoughts and emotions. Writing about your feelings of guilt can help you clarify your thoughts, recognize patterns in your behavior, and identify specific actions that led to your guilt. This clarity can be the first step towards making positive changes and moving forward.

If you are struggling with guilt that does not seem to relent, try writing down your feelings to better understand them.

Using self-reflection to discover the source of your guilt will help you know better what steps to take to address that guilt. This may involve apologizing, making amends, or rectifying the situation to the best of your ability, or going before the Lord to seek forgiveness.

Forgiving yourself for mistakes or shortcomings is also a crucial step in overcoming guilt.

By practicing self-forgiveness, you are not excusing what you have done or sweeping it aside; instead you are acknowledging it to make room for emotional healing, making it possible to let go of the emotional burden of the guilt and self-criticism that are troubling you.

Seeking Forgiveness

When you know you have done wrong, seeking forgiveness from God first is essential. You have direct access to God through prayer, and He is always ready to hear what you have to say to Him.

When asking for forgiveness, keep in mind the following steps in your prayers:

  • Name and admit the wrong you have done or the sin you have committed.
  • Recognize and acknowledge that it was wrong.
  • Apologize for it, sharing your sincere sorrow and regret with God.
  • Be honest when asking for forgiveness, don’t try to hide anything from God, who sees your heart.
  • Ask for forgiveness and accept the truth that you are then forgiven because God will answer that prayer.
  • Repent of that wrong behavior and ask God to help you keep from doing it again.

After receiving forgiveness from God, you then need to seek forgiveness from those you have hurt by your wrong.

A heartfelt apology shows that you are willing to take responsibility for your behavior and that you feel sorrow for hurting them. An apology can be a bridge to reconciliation and restoration of a relationship.

The following are important elements to keep in mind when making a sincere apology:

  • Own up to your wrongdoing and acknowledge the offense honestly.
  • Show your remorse for causing the other person pain.
  • Accept full responsibility without making excuses.
  • Show your commitment to change and not repeat the hurtful action.

Sincerity is of vital importance in seeking forgiveness, both from God and from anyone you may have offended.

Sometimes there is a need to forgive someone who has harmed you. You may have guilty feelings because you continue to be angry about the harm done to you by someone else and your inability to forgive them.

The Harvard Medical School discusses a method known as the REACH method for extending this kind of forgiveness, shared in an article about the power of forgiveness.

The REACH method is as follows:

  • Recall the wrongdoing in an objective way.
  • Empathize with the other person’s point of view.
  • Altruistic gift, or recalling how you were once forgiven, extending that same gift to someone else.
  • Commit yourself to forgive.
  • Hold on to your forgiveness, even in the face of recurring memories of the wrongdoing.

The article emphasizes that;

Forgiving a person who has wronged you is never easy, but dwelling on those events and reliving them over and over can fill your mind with negative thoughts and suppressed anger…Yet, when you learn to forgive, you are no longer trapped by the past actions of others and can finally feel free.

Embracing God’s Grace

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines grace as “unmerited divine assistance given to humans for their regeneration or sanctification.” The key word in that definition is unmerited.

In the Bible, grace refers to God’s unmerited and unearned favor, love, and mercy that He freely bestows upon humanity.

Grace is given freely because God is a gracious God, and it has nothing to do with your deeds or efforts.

When you understand God’s grace, it makes it possible to draw closer to Him. Grace and forgiveness are two sides of the same coin, in a manner of speaking, because grace is what makes forgiveness possible, and when there is no barrier between you and God, you are not afraid to approach Him with your confessions.

Knowing you have forgiveness in spite of not deserving it, you are able to resolve your feelings of guilt and find guilt relief. Grace can transform your feelings of guilt into acceptance and healing from guilt.

Some practical ways to embrace grace are to study God’s word through reading and meditating on God’s promises, praying to God to show His grace in your daily living, practice gratitude for God’s gifts to you and His mercy, and extend grace to others by serving them in humility.

Practical Steps to Overcome Guilt

There are several daily practices that will be effective ways for you to overcome guilt and strengthen your mental health and spirituality.

Prayer is vital as a means of communicating with God to name your guilt and discern where that guilt is coming from. This is important for your spiritual health.

Journaling will also help with this, as you express your feelings through writing. Journaling can also be a great way of expressing gratitude, which is also an important daily practice and a part of healing from guilt.

Talk to people you trust; by sharing your burden, you will relieve a lot of the tension that goes with carrying a load of guilt.

Share with trusted family members or friends, or a supportive community such as your church small group or other church-related group; you comfort in the support others can give who understand what you are going through.

FAQs about Guilt

The basic difference between guilt and shame is that guilt tells you that you did something bad, while shame tells you that YOU are bad. They both have similar roots related to feelings of regret, but shame speaks straight to your sense of identity, which is rarely helpful or productive.

As Becky of So Very Blessed says in her article about guilt vs. shame, “Guilt is focused on the behavior… Shame attacks your identity.

Psychology Today says in an article about the difference between healthy and unhealthy guilt:

The main difference between healthy and unhealthy guilt is the source and intensity of the guilt. Healthy guilt is a natural and appropriate response to wrongdoing, whereas unhealthy guilt is an excessive and misplaced sense of responsibility or a lack of forgiveness following healthy guilt.

Ask yourself if your guilt is serving a positive purpose? If it is not, then perhaps you are experiencing unhealthy guilt.

Prayer is one of the best ways to deal with guilt and feelings of guilt. The Psalms in the Bible are full of prayers to God seeking forgiveness and lamenting guilt in ways that bring comfort and peace to the Psalmist.

Psalm 51 is especially good as an example, where David is lamenting guilt over a real sin he committed and finds his way back to God in the process of prayer. Additionally, God is always available to you.

When you are stuck in the cycle of guilt and shame, go to God in prayer: He will give you peace that you cannot get on your own.

In this article, you hopefully learned how to understand guilt better, what the different types of guilt are and the impact it has on your life and emotional well-being.

You learned about what God says concerning guilt and what His view of it is, and the provision He made for guilt to be covered with forgiveness through Jesus Christ.

You should now better understand the consequences of living with guilt, both the emotional and mental health effects and the spiritual consequences.

You learned that unresolved guilt is a difficult burden to bear, because it affects all aspects of life.

May you experience a full measure of God’s grace as you reflect on your own experiences with guilt, as you take steps towards overcoming it, and as you share your stories with people you trust and seek support from your community or church.

A woman in deep thinking with words what God says about guilt and how to overcome it.

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